Automatic Enrollment Policies Can Make Lead Service Line Replacement Projects More Efficient

By Jack Travis

Efficiency has become something of a buzzword just about everywhere. At EPIC, we have long had efficiency on our minds, especially when it comes to replacing lead service lines (LSLs). At the heart of implementing an efficient LSL replacement (LSLR) program is protecting public health. This requires figuring out how to maximize scarce resources to replace LSLs. From our work with LSLR thought leaders (i.e., utilities, local governments, and community groups), we identified that the owner and occupant engagement and enrollment and property access phases of LSLR projects can be unnecessarily resource-intensive.

To address this, we’ve taken a deep dive into LSLR programs, drawn lessons from other utility infrastructure efforts, and developed a set of best practices to streamline these phases of the project—what we call automatic enrollment policies. This set of policies aims to make the LSLR process as automatic, property owner and occupant-friendly, and efficient as possible to allow communities to maximize the resources devoted to actual replacements.

Specifically, these policies make it easier for water utilities to access private-side LSLs for replacements and reduce the number of steps needed to implement block-by-block LSLR programs. In this whitepaper, we describe what automatic enrollment policies are and provide details on how states, municipalities, and public works programs have already put these policies into practice. Then, we outline common scenarios that utilities encounter when replacing LSLs and how automatic enrollment policies help expedite replacements in each one, even when utilities are unable to implement every policy. We hope this can be a starting point for policy advocacy and adoption.